


will you change the strings of my heart

by elios (zostir)



Category: Given (Manga)
Genre: (you know who is dead), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Coffee Shops, Confessions, Crushes, Fluff, Gift Fic, Grief/Mourning, Light Angst, M/M, Minor Character Death, aka: an universe in which mafuyama meets in haruki's café, mafuyu stop imagining things, ue belongs to you
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-07
Updated: 2019-10-07
Packaged: 2020-10-17 16:04:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20623772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zostir/pseuds/elios
Summary: "Can you really fix a guitar?""You mean, if you break a string? Of course you can! It's just a string."Mafuyu can't take his eyes off a raven-haired boy.





	will you change the strings of my heart

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ren_shi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ren_shi/gifts).

> happy birthday anto!! i was incredibly happy to write this small fic with one of my fave pairings!! as i told you, i have an idea for another ship but it will take me a lot of time, so i settled for this one instead.  
you're an incredible and nice person and i'm really glad we met! doing a little something for you was truly an honour!

The raven-haired boy always sat alone, but Mafuyu knew he wasn't a loner.

He had the behaviour of a guy who was taking a break out of the world, for only a few minutes every day. Besides, he was really friendly with the barista, calling him by his first name, _Haruki-san_, and it was obvious the older man was fond of him too. Mafuyu liked to watch them interacting. They didn't remind him of the bond he used to have with Yuuki; they couldn't be more than friends, so he didn't feel the same pang of jealousy he felt each time he saw two boys together. Even if those two boys were clearly straight and not in love with each other.

Mafuyu himself was looking for a break: that's why he, at first, had decided to go into this café. That day, the street had been loud and aggressive, filling his ears with grumbling noises, and Mafuyu had thought he would throw up if he stayed there. He had pushed the door without noticing where he was going, but the barista had welcomed him with a welcoming smile and Mafuyu's chest had become warm. He had asked for a coffee, but had forgotten his wallet, so he had promised he would pay the next time.

Since then, Mafuyu had been coming almost every day.

He didn't talk a lot, but it was no problem for the staff who didn't care as long as he paid. The long-haired barista Haruki would sometimes ask about his day, and Mafuyu would reply in a polite tone, but their chats would never go longer. And then, he noticed the dark-haired boy, too.

What first attracted his eye was his uniform, the same as him. And come to think of it, Mafuyu could have seen him at school, too, but they weren't in the same class and he tended to stay in his corner most of the time. So the only moment he could see the boy was during a very short span of time after school. The boy only stayed for ten minutes, and then he headed out, waving goodbye at his friend. He had a guitar on his back, and Mafuyu couldn't help but remember a more familiar silhouette - except that his face and hair weren't similar at all, but the posture—

Mafuyu didn't come for this boy. He wasn't looking for a potential new love, he wasn't interested in a new story at all. His had stopped a long time ago, dying with the only person that was more important than his own life. All he wanted, for now, was this peace he could only find in the café.

There was another man who was friends with the barista and the boy who attracted Mafuyu's gaze. This man didn't drop by a lot, but when he did, the dark-haired boy stayed a bit longer, and they left together. The high schooler looked at him with admiration, his cheeks flushing whenever the older man seemed to praise him. And Mafuyu always looked away, his stomach churning. See, this was what he meant when he said boys were acting too close nowadays. He knew his relationship with Yuuki couldn't compare with casual bonds of friendships, that they actually held hands and kissed, that even in general they would find a way to brush their arm against the other or to lean on the other's shoulder and whisper in the other's ear. The man with piercing and the boy with the guitar weren't acting like that. But there were always pieces of them that reminded him of Yuuki, such as:

The raven-haired boy always having his eyes on the man as soon as he pushed the door.

The raven-haired boy always offering fond, endearing smiles when the man looked at him.

The raven-haired boy always being much more relaxed when the man was here.

Oh, the boy was so lively, so different from his usual cool face that it hurt. Mafuyu didn't know why, and he refused to believe it was jealousy. He couldn't be jealous of a man who possibly had the love of a person he wasn't attracted to in the first place. Mafuyu liked boys with fire in their eyes, boys who knew where they stood. This one, however, felt like an idol with feet of clay: calm most of the time, but so easy to unhinge.

Yet Mafuyu was the one who went to him.

"You dropped this", he said, handing a small pack of strings that was similar to one of the things Yuuki always had with him.

If you asked him, Mafuyu would reply he hated music. Not really hate, actually, and maybe he only used this word as a way to protect himself. The guitar that was dear to Yuuki had disappeared after his death, even his mom had no idea where it had gone. Without it, Mafuyu felt another part of him had left this world. So all that was left was empty hatred.

The boy looked away as he took the pack in the palm of his hands. "Oh. Thank you..." His voice was trembling.

Mafuyu thought of leaving, at this moment. There was no common point between the two of them: they were living in the same place, they were breathing the same air, but their paths weren't meant to cross. Even their eyes weren't meeting. Yet, these strings made him move his lips before he could stop himself. "Can you really fix a guitar?"

The boy's head twitched and turned to him. He had wide-open eyes, and a slightly annoyed expression when he replied: "Huh? You mean, if you break a string? Of course you can! It's just a string."

An image of the past: Mafuyu remembered his fingers pinching the strings of Yuuki's guitar. When Yuuki plucked the cords, it created sound. But Mafuyu had broken the strings when he touched them. It wasn't his fault: his whole soul was in shock. He had lost Yuuki, hanged in front of him, and then had broken his guitar. He thought that, as death was eternal, the damages he had done were permanent, too. He broke his boyfriend and then the one thing he held dear.

But then, this guy said, _of course you can change the strings of a guitar_. Mafuyu wondered if things would have been different, if he knew how to repair things. Maybe relationships could be fixed, too. Maybe hearts could be fixed, too.

"I want to see how it's done." His voice sounded weirdly enthusiastic, even to his own ears.

The boy was still eyeballing him. "Yeah, well, my strings aren't broken." He brought his hand to his neck, as if embarrassed by the attention. At this moment, Mafuyu found him cute. The boy was trying his best to keep his composure, but it was obvious he was unsettled.

"Then… can you play something?" he asked.

The boy's cheeks became red. "Huh?! Where do you think we are? We're in a café!"

"Come on, Uenoyama", Haruki stepped in. "We can make an exception if this young man wants to. You're the only patrons anyway."

Mafuyu looked around him: there were, indeed, only the three of them in this small room. The older man with piercings and a smile that could break _Uenoyam_a's composure - so this was his name - wasn't here. He felt relieved.

Eager, Mafuyu nodded. "Please, Uenoyama-kun."

The boy sighed. "Alright, but only because Haruki-san is okay with it."

Mafuyu observed him as he brought his guitar out of the huge bag he used to carry it, and watched him playing with the strings and a bunch of huge screws at the top of the neck. Mafuyu didn't know which words to use if he had to describe them, nor did he know what the musician was doing; it was, somehow, similar to Yuuki, but at the same time very different. Yuuki always looked at him in the eye when he was preparing his instrument, as if saying, _I'll show you what I can do, so don't look away_. It was to the point that sometimes, Mafuyu felt he didn't care about him anymore, the guitar being his true lover and Mafuyu a witness. Was he trying to run away from Mafuyu through music? Did he decide to start music for the sake of his boyfriend but got lost in the middle? Mafuyu would never know which one was true, if he was more important than music or not.

Uenoyama, however, never cast a glance at him. Yet Mafuyu had no doubt he was thinking about him at this moment; that's why he was hesitant to do it in the first place. Uenoyama was bent on his guitar, so he couldn't see his face, but he figured it was a mix of concentration and half-concealed anxiety.

"So, what do you want to hear?"

Mafuyu didn't know anything about music. There was only one answer he could give: "Something cool."

He heard a puff behind his back, and Uenoyama sighed. "Dumb question, I guess."

Uenoyama plucked the strings of the guitar.

Mafuyu couldn't tell what genre this song belonged to, or what it was supposed to talk about. But there were feelings he could relate to - loneliness, doubts, emptiness. He never thought a suite of notes could convey emotions in such a clear way, and for him who didn't know how to vent his pain, it was almost unbearable.

He fought against his tears.

Mafuyu was surprised when Uenoyama started to wave at him each time they ran into each other at school. Uenoyama was never alone: he was always with one of his two friends, one being so cordial he was already calling Mafuyu out when the boy was passing by, the other quieter but not exactly reserved. Mafuyu soon learnt their names, too, Ueki Ryuu and Itaya Shougo, and the barista's full name, Nakayama Haruki, and even the name of the other man, Kaji Akihiko. All these names were dancing in his heads, and sometimes, when he let his mind wander, he'd have one on the tip of his tongue, and the syllables were heavy in his mouth.

It was weird, to know people - even though he didn't know them a lot and they were definitely not friends, but he got used to them. After he transferred, he grew accustomed to the solitude. Spending his time alone, not talking to his classmates except for group works, watching other people as he sipped his own cup in the café - this was all he ever needed. His heart was too cold for bonding.

Uenoyama Ritsuka, however, had found a way under his skin. Mafuyu couldn't get him out of his mind; there was always something that would remind him of this boy, dumb pretexts like a cat with the same hair colour as Uenoyama's, or an instant of music when he walked in the street. The worse thing was, they had begun to talk to each other, as Mafuyu couldn't refrain the questions he never dared to ask Yuuki.

"How does it feel, to play the guitar?"

"Is it hard to write a song?"

"Why did you start doing music?"

And so, so many more. At his point, he couldn't get Yuuki's answers, but Uenoyama's ones were satisfying. The boy knew his own reasons, but otherwise, he wasn't that good at explaining what it meant to be a guitarist. He drew a blurry image of his passion, an image Mafuyu could accept. Of course, he couldn't understand Yuuki, it wasn't a matter of questioning him or not. He had to experience it himself before understanding - but he didn't have a guitar, so he couldn't do it. He didn't have the money to pay for an instrument; all he had was his voice.

And he didn't know how things happened; Mafuyu couldn't _sing_ \- he lacked the words - but he liked to hum when he thought he was alone.

There was this air he couldn't get rid of, especially now that Yuuki was dead, this "weird song" that was always on his lips. He didn't know where it came from, but now it was his own solace.

This day, in the empty café, when Haruki went at the back trusting him not to steal money in the cash register, Mafuyu let them out. This melody that could very well be happy but sounded sad when it escaped his throat. These _lala lala_ that were his only way to truly sing, to express a part of his repressed feelings. He had his eyes closed but he could still see the light through his eyelids. He couldn't hear anything else other than his own sound, unaware of the music coming from the small radio and the light rumour of the street far away. He was deaf but at the same time he was listening to something new, to the lament of his heart - and he couldn't do it anymore.

So he stopped, breathing in slowly to calm himself down.

"Do you want to join my band?"

Right in his back, Uenoyama was gaping at him. His eyes were enamoured and Mafuyu wondered if he, himself, wasn't a bit in love with him.


End file.
